Sunday, September 28, 2008

That's right! I'm now a 26 year-old! I'm fortunate to have enjoyed my past several birthdays in pretty interesting places:

2005 - Chicago2006 - Barcelona2007 - Rome2008 - Monterrey

Last year, it was authentic Italian pizza and gelato. This year, Carlos and I celebrated at Peter Piper Pizza with a "Chicago Style Pizza". Apparently in other parts of the country/world, pepperoni, sausage, mushrooms, and green peppers are all it takes to make a pizza "Chicago Style". Regardless, the pizza was good, which is why we went there.

Afterward, we went with Nico for a long walk under the stars (or whatever can be seen under the smoggy Monterrey sky). The best part of my birthday was being together as a whole family! Here's hoping for the next one, we'll all be back in Chicago.

Saturday, September 27, 2008

I flew in on Mexicana yesterday, which was great! Direct flight from O'Hare to Monterrey, only 3.5 hours. They did ask for my Doctor's permission to fly right away at the check-in when they saw me, so apparently I look really pregnant now! The flight was great, I love Mexicana. They even serve real meals during the flight!

Only snag was getting through customs, and not for the usual type of reason. No, in my case it's that 15 or so flights in a year have taken their toll on the suitcase I chose, and having lost a leg somewhere between Europe and Mexico, it now lost a wheel on this flight. This only caused a problem when I had to hoist it off the customs baggage scanner and the sharky businessman behind me felt it would be helpful to push me, so that I was off-balance and dropped the already-unbalanced suitcase ON MY TOE! I emerged from customs frazzled, pregnant, dragging an injured suitcase, and gushing blood from the toe. But all will be OK, I've got the offended toe disinfected and wrapped up and I'll be fine. :)

Being re-united with Carlos was AWESOME and it feels good to be home, despite the ever-increasing pollution and absolutely unbelievable level of traffic chaos. The important part is being together. Carlos is fascinated by the belly, and has to keep touching it to see if it's all for real! Nico is HUGE now, and it's been fun to be re-united with him as well.

Shortly I will be posting about the itinerary for the remainder of the trip. Gotta grab something to eat first.

us

Married since May 2007, parents since December 2008, we held our little family together across the US-Mexican border for over three years. After facing the reality that living together in the US wouldn't be possible, we moved on to adventures together in South Korea for a few years, and now have returned to our passport countries to push once and for all to bring Carlos home.

Here, I blog about our adventures in parenting, travel, multilingualism, maintaining multiple cultures while living abroad, immigration, policy, and keeping it all together while we confront this process.